


Sweet Dreams, Sheena

by elivan



Category: Tales of Symphonia
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, talesfemslashweek2017
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-20
Updated: 2017-07-20
Packaged: 2018-12-04 12:31:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11555268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elivan/pseuds/elivan
Summary: Colette still can't sleep, at least not normally. She can close her eyes and pretend, but the dreams never come and the darkness and the quiet feels too much like when she lost herself for her to do it for long...





	Sweet Dreams, Sheena

**Author's Note:**

> For [Tales of Femslash Week](http://talesfemslashweek.tumblr.com/)! Day Four: Dreams.

Colette still can't sleep, at least not normally. She can close her eyes and pretend, but the dreams never come and the darkness and the quiet feels too much like when she lost herself for her to do it for long. Instead she 'wakes up' shortly after each change of the watch and talks with them for a while before falling back 'asleep' a few minutes before the next change. She's sure they all figured it out by now, but Lloyd and Raine are the only ones that pressed her about it, and they both understood when she explained what scared her of…

Tonight her shift is the second, and she 'wakes up' to thank Regal for keeping watch, and then watches as he falls asleep for real. Soon, it's just her and the stars for the night.

She watches the others sleep, and wonders about what they're seeing in their dreams tonight. Some of them mumble in their sleep, like Genis, so Colette can easily guess from that since "so...so much candy…" is a pretty good giveaway. Others, like Raine, sleep so still that Colette has to think a little harder about what sort of dreams they're having...Hopefully about dogs, dreaming about dogs seem very nice. Maybe Raine's meeting with dogs in an ancient ruin somewhere…

A choked-off sob pulls Colette away from Raine's imagined dream, and sees Sheena trembling softly under her blanket. Careful not to make anymore noise than necessary, Colette walks over to the edge of Sheena's blanket and looks down at her. Sheena's eyes are still tightly closed, though Colette can see the faint sheen of tears on her scrunched up face.

"A bad dream…" Colette says, more to herself than to Sheena, before kneeling down by her. She doesn't like the idea of waking someone up when they're still able to sleep, but she likes the idea of leaving Sheena in a nightmare less, and a little louder she says, "Sheena, wake up."

When it's not enough, Colette reaches over to give her a gentle nudge. Which seems to do the trick as Sheena immediately jolts and swings her fist at Colette, who catches it before it reaches her face. There's a moment of struggle before Sheena blinks, looking wide-eyed at her.

"Co-Colette!" Sheena stammers then sits up properly and pulls her hands back.

Colette lets go. "I'm sorry...You seemed like you were having a bad dream so I thought I should wake you…"

Sheena looks down at her blanket. "I...I guess I was." She gives Colette a glance out of the corner of her eye. "You should be a little more careful. I-I was trained to fight at a moment's notice so I really could've hurt you…!"

"Oh don't worry about that!" Colette smiles, trying to sound a little more cheery to help Sheena relax. "Even if you hit me, it probably wouldn't have hurt that much, so there isn't anything to worry about."

"That's…" Sheena stops, then shakes her head. There's a long moment of silence before she lets out a deep sigh. "Thank you for waking me, Colette. Just...use a long stick or something next time, okay?"

Colette laughs a little at the thought. "Okay, I'll use a reaaaally long stick next time." Sheena gives her an exasperated look, so Colette changes the topic back. "Are you feeling better at least?"

"...A little. It was just…" Sheena clutches her blanket tightly. "I was dreaming about Corrine…"

"Oh…" Colette clasps her hands tightly together. She knows what happened, but… "I'm sorry…"

Sheena sighs again and gives her a faint smile. "It's all right just...I still miss him." Then she looks down at the pillow she was resting her head on just a moment ago. "...I don't want to fall back asleep."

Colette looks down at the pillow as well, then stands when she gets an idea. "Hold on." She walks around the campfire to grab her own pillow while Sheena watches with a raised brow, then returns and drops her pillow down next to Sheena's before dropping down to the ground next to her. "There...I'll sleep next to you tonight. That way, you'll know I'm there if it's another bad dream."

As she explains, Sheena's face turns redder and redder. "Y-You'll--?" She stammers, "I-I mean, you don't _need_ to do that…"

Colette bites her tongue a little to keep from giggling from her reaction. She doesn't want to laugh after the nightmare Sheena just had but...she gets embarrassed so easily and it's...cute. "It'll be like a sleepover...That'll make it much more fun to fall asleep, don't you think."

"I...I guess so…" Sheena's still bright red, but eventually she lays back down and rests her head against the pillow. She pats the other pillow and Colette lays down besides Sheena while she drapes the blanket over them both.

They both look up at the starry night quietly for a moment, before Sheena speaks again. "Um...Is it okay if…"

Colette turns her head to look at her, and sees that Sheena's already looking at her nervously, as though she's worried about asking too much. "...If what?"

"...If you hold my hand while I fall back asleep."

This time Colette _does_ giggle, softly. "Oh! Of course!" And she happily takes Sheena's hand. "I'll hold your hand anytime, okay?"

Sheena nods and grips her hand tightly. "...Thank you, Colette."

"You're welcome." Colette smiles at her. "I can tell you about some of the dogs I met the other day, so you can dream about them too."

Sheena laughs softly and relaxes, just a little. "I'll like that…"

Excitedly, Colette starts telling her all about Pooky and Boo and Chibi, until Sheena's grip on her hand relaxes, and Colette can see her sleeping soundly with a smile on her face.

Colette watches her sleep for a long moment, then snuggles in juuuust a bit closer. She can't join Sheena in her dreams, but Colette almost feels like she could. 

"Sweet dreams, Sheena…"


End file.
